


Angels Wait to Take Me Home

by telm_393



Category: The Magnificent Seven (2016)
Genre: Angst and Tragedy, Bittersweet Ending, Canon Compliant, Developing Relationship, Dreams, First Kiss, Future Fic, Grief/Mourning, Last Kiss, M/M, Off-Screen Sam Chisolm/Red Harvest/Vasquez, Past Sibling Loss
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-08-08
Updated: 2017-08-08
Packaged: 2018-12-12 21:58:02
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,420
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11745987
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/telm_393/pseuds/telm_393
Summary: Vasquez and Faraday: their first and only kiss, what they could have been, and the life Vasquez led instead.





	Angels Wait to Take Me Home

**Author's Note:**

  * For [within_a_dream](https://archiveofourown.org/users/within_a_dream/gifts).



> Do note that the 'sibling loss' tag is also the death of a baby. It makes sense in context.
> 
> The title doesn't have much to do with the story, honestly, but it's from "I Am Weary (Let Me Rest)", which is the saddest Country/Western standard I know. 
> 
> The song was written several decades after the events of the film, so please forgive the titular historical inaccuracy.
> 
> Also, recip: I hope you don't mind my including Sam/RH/Vasquez in the fic, since it was your other relationship request!

Domingo Ricardo Araya Vasquez was born too soon and was tinier than even a baby should’ve been.

He never so much as lifted his head, but his smile was sweet.

Vasquez was ten years old, and he knew that he and Domingo wouldn’t have much time together. He knew that the dreams he had of a brother he could teach, work beside, protect, were nothing more than ghosts of memories, dead before they could even be made.

Every moment with Domingo gnawed at Vasquez’s heart, told him he had to memorize him quickly because they had nothing together but the end.

One night, Domingo went to sleep, and then he didn’t wake up, and that was that.

Vasquez’s mother wept with the bitter finality of a woman who knew in her heart that she was going to raise an only child. She was right.

In the end, Domingo lived for three months, and Vasquez can still see his ugly, scrunched little face when he closes his eyes.

Sometimes, not often, not anymore, he wonders what that child would have grown into, because he never really became anything, in the end, did he? Vasquez may have memorized his face, may have loved him, but he isn't sure he ever knew him. Only his smile, his laughter, his touch, and then the empty space that he left, filled with lost promise.

Joshua Faraday leaves a space in Vasquez’s life a little like that, and it's Faraday’s death that makes him think of Domingo for what he realizes with a jolt is the first time in years.

There was a time--one that, relative to the rest of Vasquez’s life, was short-- when Domingo’s death dominated everything. His home, his memories, his heart.

Now Faraday's death does the same. The hope and promise and want that he brought with him when he entered Vasquez’s world, all the things that ended before they could start, they cloud Vasquez's life.

Vasquez misses him, but he mostly misses all the things they didn’t have, possibilities cobbled together from moments stolen during borrowed time.

His memories of Faraday are vivid and aching and full of a sense of incompleteness.

He remembers Faraday’s restlessness, his recklessness, everything that made him seem too big for just one body, that made his presence impossible to ignore.

He remembers the huge, shining grin that he wanted to see again and again.

He remembers the mischief in Faraday's eyes and the stubborn set of his jaw and the edge of glee in his drawl when he needled Vasquez.

Whenever Faraday got close to him, and it happened more and more as the days went on, Vasquez felt like half of a whole, and he liked it.

He liked _Faraday,_ who was so easy to talk to, even if it was mostly snide comments and teasing and reluctant or boisterous laughter depending on how drunk they were, even if they ignored what was under the surface, the excitement of finding someone who was like them, who they fit with.

Vasquez saw a future with him. He saw it every time Faraday was near him, every time they touched, side by side until the very end.

And he saw it when they kissed.

Vasquez can still feel it viscerally, the insistent press of lips against his, the taste of whiskey on his tongue, the smell of soil and gunpowder, the want that set him on fire, the hot breath against his face, lips trailing down his cheek, his neck, big hands pulling hard at his hair as they both touched every inch of exposed skin they could find—

Sometimes he thinks he dreamt that kiss, maybe because it features in so many of his dreams these days, but it’s too vivid a memory to be imagined.

In that moment, nothing seemed to matter at all anymore except each other, because it was just before the battle and both of them knew that it could very well be the only time they’d get the chance to test their attraction, to feel each other like they wanted to.

It was full of heat and hope and plain curiosity and excitement, because their attraction was just as strong as they thought.

But there wasn’t enough time, both of them knew it; certainly not to do everything they wanted.

Faraday’s hands wandered to the button of Vasquez’s trousers, but his hand was stilled by a knock at the door. _It’s time._

They broke apart, faces still close enough for each to see the other in perfect detail, and for a moment Vasquez couldn’t move, because when Faraday smiled with spit-slick lips, this crooked, confident, easy thing, it took Vasquez’s breath away.

 _I could fall in love with you,_ he thought, and there was no time to dwell on it, because life went on, the sounds of a brewing battle cutting through the moment, and so Vasquez and Josh stepped away from each other.

But after they got ready to fight, and probably die, in a silence more companionable than Vasquez could’ve ever imagined, Faraday walked back up to him, guns on his hips and smirk on his face, and leaned in close to say, voice low and laughing, “Guess we’ll finish that later.”

At that, Vasquez grinned and, high on reckless hope, said, “Count on it, guero.”

It was a broken promise, but so was everything that they did that hinted at a future, because Faraday was supposed to go out with a bang, and when he got the perfect chance, he took it. Of course he did.

Vasquez doubts that he ever crossed Faraday’s mind in those last moments.

He’s not even sure if he hopes he did.

Faraday was as explosive as the dynamite that tore him to pieces, and Vasquez wonders how long they would’ve lasted anyway.

Another thing he’ll never know.

People like them die young, and Vasquez was stupid, letting himself think, even without really noticing, that the way that he felt about Faraday could mean enough to spare him.

It was nothing but desperate, overexcited attraction, the kind of spell war puts on a man.

That’s what Vasquez tells himself, after, when he wakes up from dream after dream of the man he lost without ever having, bitter disappointment tearing at his already ragged heart when he remembers that all the possibilities that bloomed with one kiss died before ever growing into something real.

In those dreams, it’s always the same, just flashes of stolen moments or, worse, moments that never even happened, never had the chance to happen.

They’re sometimes interspersed with visions of fire and smoke, explosions that wake him up sweating and shaking, wishing for a warm, living body next to him, for Faraday’s warm, living body next to him.

They never slept with each other.

They never even lay side by side.

That thought makes Vasquez’s heart hurt like it’s being torn in half, because they were only with each other for some weeks but he can still feel an empty space where a man he never really knew should be.

He can still hear Faraday’s voice, can still feel his absence like he mattered, but Faraday shouldn’t have mattered so much, certainly shouldn’t remind him of Domingo at all. It’s absurd. Faraday and Domingo's short existences were completely different, other than how the stories of the lives they shared with Vasquez weren’t really stories at all.

Just long endings.

Faraday wasn’t family, and around for even less than three months.

But somehow Vasquez still feels that bitter, disappointed sadness, that longing for all the things that never happened.

Because no matter what he tells himself after, there was something about Faraday that honestly made Vasquez feel like he would’ve stuck around after the battle, would've stuck around for the rest of Vasquez's life, and Vasquez feels his absence with every heartbeat.

 _Someday, it won’t be like this,_ he tells himself.

_Someday, you’ll forget._

_Someday, you’ll stop dreaming about him._

Only one of those things is true.

 

Vasquez is on a walk with a man he knew, but it takes him a moment to recognize the companion with whom he’s sharing such a comfortable silence.

Josh’s hair is shining copper under the setting sun, and Vasquez feels a pained surprise at his presence, at the sudden but not unfamiliar reminder that this man existed.

Vasquez lets himself breathe as he walks next to what could have been, the man who was buried in pieces, whose memory rests in one of the four graves that Vasquez visits less and less, these days.

They’re wandering through the green grass, which is turning golden now that it's fall. They pause next to Rose Creek’s namesake and that's where they sit, under a tree, its fallen leaves crunching under them as they settle on the ground, shoulder to shoulder. Josh is staring out at the water, and Vasquez is staring at him.

Josh turns his head. Looks at him, finally.

The sun is in that place in the sky where it’s gotten low enough that it’s hanging just over the creek, shining in their faces before it lowers itself into darkness.

It bathes Josh’s already sun-kissed face in golden light, and Vasquez brings his wrinkled hand to Josh's face and traces its shape, takes in the sharp awareness and curiosity and amused affection in its gleaming eyes, which are gray and blue and green by turns, like Josh’s face is trying to choose which color looks best, which color is right.

Josh begins to smile, but his lips crack. He runs his tongue over them before they lift into a proper smile, which grows to an almost gleeful grin. Vasquez knows the expression--Josh has found something to make fun of, something to tease him about.

Vasquez waits with an aching fondness in his chest.

Josh moves his hand to Vasquez’s still-thick but no longer black hair and runs his fingers through it. When he removes it, he comes away with strands trapped in his fingers, and, with a huff of amusement, he holds his hand out and shows Vasquez a gray hair.

Josh says nothing, uncharacteristic of the real person, but just like the one Vasquez sees these days in these now rare dreams that he doesn’t try to wake himself up from, not anymore. These days, Vasquez only knows what Josh would say, only feels his voice in his mind. Refugio Vasquez lost Joshua Faraday's voice a decade ago.

_Look at you, old man. Amazing you could even keep up._

Vasquez rolls his eyes. “Fine, I’ll admit I’m not so young anymore,” he says. “None of us are.”

_Not just old, soft. You’re different._

They all are.

Vasquez thinks of watching Sam weave together Red Harvest’s graying braids, all of the conversations Vasquez never imagined the three of them would have, in English and Spanish and Comanche.

He thinks of the no longer tentative way Red Harvest’s lips brush against Vasquez’s, against Sam’s, how Red Harvest reaches out to them, turns his face towards them even when he ignores everything else. How at some point he started spending so much more time on solid ground, how he plays with the children of the children they once saved. How his smile shines like stars.

And Vasquez thinks of Sam, who insists he’ll be dying any day now and has been saying so for a good five years, ever since they retired and went back to the town that they knew was home. How Sam’s touch is much gentler now, a little because he’s gotten weaker and a little because he’s found peace with age and the presence of the other two just like they have, and so he doesn’t feel the need to be brisk and detached anymore. His affection is less distant than it’s ever been, because he really is reaching the end, his hard-earned eternal rest.

Sam speaks more about the past too, and Teddy Q’s daughter the reporter writes down those stories. Goodnight often features in them, and, of course, they’ve told the story of the Battle of Rose Creek a thousand times, the battle and all the moments in between, though Vasquez has never said a word about what could have been with him and Josh.

About that last moment they had together, the one that promised many, many more like them if they’d just both survive.

 _That’s just for me and you,_ he thinks.

But even with Red Harvest's and Sam's words flowing freer than Josh or Goodnight or Billy or Jack could’ve imagined, Vasquez still talks the most.

He’s the one who fills up the many silences between them, who fills up all the empty spaces there would be without him in the life they built after the loss of the others, who Vasquez still thinks of sometimes too, all of them together, not just Josh. How they worked so well together, well enough that they might’ve been, in another world, a team.

He talks even more than he did when he knew Josh, though he thinks that that’s because of Josh, because he tried to pick up the slack for the voice he somehow knew so well, even after so little time.

Now, with Josh’s ghost in front of him, Vasquez still talks enough for both of them.

“What did you expect anyway? People change with time,” Vasquez points out, and Josh raises his eyebrows.

“You’re right,” Vasquez thinks with a gentle ache in his chest, an old, faded sadness. “You didn’t. Or Goodnight, or Billy, or Jack…”

He trails off, and Josh shrugs.

_That’s life, can’t be moping about it._

Vasquez nods in agreement, still staring at Josh, taking him in, marveling at the face he remembers so well, though the others faded long ago. That's life.

Josh looks peaceful in this light, eyes half-lidded and smile easy and Vasquez knows he's dead and, considering everything, probably not in Heaven, at least not yet, but the unanswerable question still slips out. "How are you?"

_So far, so good._

The words are less painful than they have ever been, and they make Vasquez smile as they weave through every part of him, tugging him forward until his and Josh’s lips are nearly touching.

He feels an old want, this threadbare almost-love, soft and worn. It has settled comfortably in his patchwork heart after all these years.

“I still miss you,” he admits, breathing the words out like a revelation just before their lips meet.


End file.
